Sunday, December 23, 2012

23 December 2012 Table for two, pack of three

We drove into Johnson City last night to have dinner at a
Thai restaurant that had received a favorable review. We thought, perhaps, that we might do some
shopping en route. We need to replace a
UPS, need new bulbs for the security lamps, and thought to replace some newly discovered
frozen dinner items that Gloria finds both palatable and healthy.

This plan
took us into Johnson City by way of Jonesborough. We were able to look at a fair selection of
lighted homes along 107 and 81highways. The
bank ATM refused to accept my debit card.
After three attempts to make a deposit, we gave up and proceeded with
the plan of the day. The parking lot at Wal-Mart
was packed as we approached the exit. We
decided that nothing on our list was necessary enough to join that mob of
milling cars and frantic buyers. On to
dinner!

We had
checked to be sure the restaurant was open, decided against a reservation, and
arrived to find a full dining room.
Still, we were seated within 5 minutes.
The menu is a broad spectrum sampling of modern and more traditional
Thai cuisine. We shared two appetizers,
stir-fried mussels and fried calamari. I
opted for a sliced beef salad and shrimp spring rolls. Gloria ordered a steamed red snapper entrée. I added a Pad Thai entrée, knowing that it
would almost certainly be transported homeward.
Service was rapid, unobtrusive, and the staff was well informed about
the menu items.

We watched a
group of people seated next to us box up their leftovers and then walk out
while leaving them on the table. We
found this mildly amusing. They decided
either that they didn’t want to take their food home, or they were more forgetful
than I want to become.

We shared a
fried ice cream dessert. The format was
somewhat unlike what we expected. The
ice cream was sent to the fryer in what tasted like a cake batter. Not unpleasant, but not necessarily a repeat
item for us.

We paid up,
got ready to face the cold, and walked away from the table without the
leftovers. The error was noticed before
we made it through the door. I’ll enjoy
Pad Thai tonight.

The drive
home was uneventful. The light displays
were less apparent on 67 highway.

As we walked
up the stairs to the front of the deck, we were suddenly surrounded by three
dogs, all-insistent on our attention and all trying to get to the Pad
Thai. They were extremely difficult to
chase away from the door. Getting inside
without them meant having to force them all off the deck in order to keep them
from jumping on us or through the screen door.

The dogs are
someone’s bear dogs. They were wearing
locator colors and owner ID plates on their collars. However, the constant jostling for position
and the glare of the flashlight on the brass collar plate, made it impossible to
read the phone number on the collar. The dogs are used to locate and chase bears
toward the hunters if possible. If they
lose the bear or can’t locate one, they will roam over half the county or more
looking for their owners, home, food, or shelter.

We finally
shoved them back far enough to get through the door without them. We don’t know if the dogs belong to the
family compound at the head of the valley, if they wandered in from another
valley, or even from North Carolina.
They looked reasonably gaunt and were wet and dirty. They are probably expensive dogs. No doubt, in the next day or so we’ll see
someone driving on Cassi road with a RDF antennae held outside the truck,
looking for a locator hit on the dog’s transmitters.

Loki was very
interested in finding the dogs when I took her out last night. She was still eager to track down the
invaders who are not present today. The dog
pack’s insistence on occupying space we knew to be ours reminded me of the
pre-song patter from The Dillards rendition of Old Blue.